This is what my 29 gallon has looked like for the past six months. You can see it's not very exciting. Today I am going to get her ready for fish and plants. The first thing I need to do is add the peat moss, which is going to be the bottom layer in this tank. I want to add more than just a dusting so I mixed it with water before I placed it on the bottom of the tank.
After the peat moss was added I carefully poured 3/4 of a 10lb bag of SAPS onto the peat and evened it out.
As I was afraid the SAPS is too light to hold down plants on its own I added 3 5lb bags of gravel from Walmart. Before I did that I added some mulm (fish poop and debris) from my 10 gallon tank to aid in starting the bacterial filter. I then placed the rocks I had boiled a day or two earlier and added some water so the mulm wouldn't dry out. (Being a nursing mom I had to do this in stages over the course of the day.)
Finally I set up the filter and the heater, filled the rest of the tank with treated tap water, and turned it all on. Voila! Elle est finie. As a final step, I added about 5ml of ammonia so that I could start fishless cycling before my plant order (yet to be placed) arrives.
That cool driftwood looking piece in my tank is actually petrified wood! I just happened to have the perfect specimen sitting in our front yard. Next, the fishless cycle...
This is what my 29 gallon has looked like for the past six months. You can see it's not very exciting. Today I am going to get her ready for fish and plants. The first thing I need to do is add the peat moss, which is going to be the bottom layer in this tank. I want to add more than just a dusting so I mixed it with water before I placed it on the bottom of the tank.
After the peat moss was added I carefully poured 3/4 of a 10lb bag of SAPS onto the peat and evened it out.
As I was afraid the SAPS is too light to hold down plants on its own I added 3 5lb bags of gravel from Walmart. Before I did that I added some mulm (fish poop and debris) from my 10 gallon tank to aid in starting the bacterial filter. I then placed the rocks I had boiled a day or two earlier and added some water so the mulm wouldn't dry out. (Being a nursing mom I had to do this in stages over the course of the day.)
Finally I set up the filter and the heater, filled the rest of the tank with treated tap water, and turned it all on. Voila! Elle est finie. As a final step, I added about 5ml of ammonia so that I could start fishless cycling before my plant order (yet to be placed) arrives.
That cool driftwood looking piece in my tank is actually petrified wood! I just happened to have the perfect specimen sitting in our front yard. Next, the fishless cycle...
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